“Our office manager was upset that people weren’t responding promptly enough to the Christmas party invitation,” says our submitter in San Diego.

In keeping with the holiday spirit of things, the office manager  apparently channeled that anger into the posting of this (uncredited) About.com excerpt in the office kitchen, for the edification of all. How that’s for savoir faire?

related: An evening of congenial abnormality

With morale at many companies coasting towards all-time lows, those peppy human resources specialists keep coming up with new budget-conscious ways to keep us worker bees happily humming along. To wit: “Popcorn Thursday.” Sounds like a total blast, right?

Meanwhile, an anonymous post-it writer in Denver speaks up for how employees really feel about these “morale boosters.”

related: A sign (or ten) that your HR department might have too much time on their hands

Happy Thxgiving, everyone!

related: It takes a “genius” to come up with a potluck theme like this one

Spotted by Lange from Cambridge, Massachusetts while campaigning for Obama in New Hampshire. Says Lange: “We decided against bugging them with our political spiel. (We assumed they were Obama supporters anyway.)”

Meanwhile, corporate belt-tightening isn’t going over so well with the office grunts this Halloween. “This was the response to the environment/holiday committee’s lack of Halloween candy in the office after already ‘decorating’ the office with empty candy containers,” says our submitter in Los Angeles.

In Oakridge, Oregon, however — as our submitter Tyree noticed — they don’t go in much for subtlety.

related: Pumpkin with a death wish

Dealing with the rantings of your crazy boss or overzealous receptionist is one thing, but what do you do when your office’s resident passive-aggressive note-leaver doesn’t even work there? Casey in San Diego (a.k.a. RunBarbara) says that’s the situation she’s found herself in at her job.

The offender, Sandra, “has met me a total of twice, both times for less than a minute,” Casey says. Yet for some reason, when Sandra (the aunt of the owner) stops by the office once a week to water the plants and drop off supplies, “she leaves these strange notes EVERYWHERE — and she almost always directs questions about said notes to me,” Casey says. “I often have no idea she posts these notes until someone asks me about the odd directions in them.”

Below, a small sampling of Sandra’s delightfully bizarrre directives. (Just click on the photos to enlarge.)

I’d like to think this note was posted immediately following the “potluck”…

related: The return of Thx Sandra!

“We really don’t hate the holidays,” says our anonymous foreign-policy elf in Washington, D.C., “just passive-aggressive coworkers.”

related: Perhaps a committee to assess the health of the committee?

Our anonymous submitter from Dallas works in the creative department of a large corporation that’s recently cut back on extras like holiday parties and cake and fruit. This Scrooge-like misanthropy seems to have taken a toll on staff morale — even among the determined breed of office “fun fund” leaders.

(Click to enlarge; transcription below!

subject: Secret Santa

Since we have no more motherly types left (Denise, Andrea, etc.), I have been elected to be the cruise director this year.

We’re doing it from next Monday (the 10th) to next Friday (the 14th), since people will start going out of town the week after that.

We have a $20 max. You can spend it however you like. You can get your person a $4 gift every day, a big $20 gift on the last day, or however you want to break it up.

If you’ like to participate, please come sign up at my desk by tomorrow by noon. I will be drawing the names at lunch time. It’s not mandatory for everyone to play, but just do it. Don’t be a grinch!

If you don’t care what your Santa gets you that is fine, but if you do, please post a “Secret Santa Wish List” on your cube, so that they will have an idea what you like, and can go shopping this weekend.

Also, don’t give people used stuff (the person who gave me the half burned candle two years ago knows who they are!).

related: If you can afford $10 worth of flair…

I think what fascinates me most about this e-mail, from the head of the party planning committee — excuse me, “fun fund” — at an office in Toronto, is the subject line. Not only does the writer ignore the obvious “let them eat cake,” she vetoes the direct approach (“hey, fatty”) in favor of the utterly nonsensical “for your records.”

(click to enlarge!)

related: If you can afford $10 worth of flair…

Says “anony-scrooge”:

My office is ridiculous about cards and donations. The smallest of occasions warrants cards, money, balloons, flowers, a singing telegram, etc. Last Christmas was no exception. By mid-December, we had been asked for no less than $150 each in contributions for this and that.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was the sudden appearance of a Christmas ‘adopt a family’ program, and the family selected was one of our employees who had very recently fell asleep at the wheel and crashed his car. It was all very tragic (sarcasm), but many people drew the line at putting more money in the hat to replace his giant mystery machine van. So almost nobody gave. Well, somebody was pissed…